Fiber is fast, but copper is reliable—even during multi-week power outages.

The power of copper and its limitations

Why don't fiber phone lines keep working during power outages?

“The simplest answer is that copper conducts electricity and fiber doesn’t,” telecommunications consultant Fred Goldstein, who has helped carriers with network design and provided expert testimony to state regulatory agencies and the FCC, told Ars. “For over 100 years, phones were always powered from the central office. The central office would have batteries and generators to back up the batteries. Even in the event of a power failure, telephone service would continue to operate. When fiber optics came in, that no longer applied because fiber optics don't conduct electricity.”

“For over 100 years, phones were always powered from the central office.”

There are benefits to fiber, Goldstein noted: besides its superiority in delivering high-speed data, fiber optics are safer because they do not conduct lightning, and you don’t have to worry about crossing fiber wires with electrical wires. Goldstein says the move to fiber is “probably inevitable because fiber is in general a superior medium for communications. It can do more than copper. But you have to take power into account.”

Goldstein attributes the poor maintenance of copper in part to changes in price regulations that occurred in the 1990s. Traditionally, there was rate-of-return regulation, in which “state utility commissions would study companies’ finances and determine what expenditures were allowable and what a proper rate of return was,” he said. That was scrapped in many states for price cap regulation, in which phone companies are “allowed to keep any additional profits they make by improving their efficiency.”

“In the case of the copper networks, they've allowed them to deteriorate so they're no longer following best practices," Goldstein claimed. "As far as [Verizon CEO] Lowell McAdam and [AT&T CEO] Randall Stephenson are concerned, the money is in watching cat videos on iPhones. They're putting all their money into wireless subsidiaries and letting wireline subsidiaries rot.”

“Decades-old” copper relies on paper insulation

Beginning more than a century ago, copper telephone wires were insulated with paper and wrapped in lead sheaths. In the 1950s, the phone industry started using plastic-insulated wire, recognizing that it could better withstand water.

But paper-insulated wire was never entirely phased out.

"There was a depreciation schedule. The longest depreciation on copper wire was 40 years. It was expected by the mid-1990s that all the paper cable would be gone," Goldstein said.

"In today’s environment, the majority of telephone distribution cables are plastic insulated conductors (PIC)," Don McCarty, a consultant with decades of experience in the telephone industry, wrote in 2011. "There are still untold thousands of feet of pulp- and paper-insulated feeder cables. They will be in use until every duct leaving a central office is free of copper and filled with fiber."

"Major pulp and paper cable disasters have been averted because of good air pressure policies by large operating Telcos," McCarty wrote. "A quality air pressure program mitigates wet pulp cables in conduit runs. Keep in mind that some of those old cables are lead sheath and are susceptible to electrolysis; splices leak, and air pressure is not properly maintained. These pulp cables will get wet, putting countless customers out of service."

Goldstein noted that during Hurricane Sandy, "it turned out that much of lower Manhattan still had paper-insulated cable in use," and they could not withstand the storm, he said.

Verizon says the damage inflicted on its New York City facilities during Sandy was enough to take out any type of copper system, whether paper or plastic.

"We do have cable pressurization systems inside our central offices that force air onto copper cables," Bonomo told Ars. "It does not matter whether the copper is encased and insulated in paper or plastic; the pressurization system is used for both... The air dryers (cable pressurization system) in our West Street central office were sheared off their concrete mounts, and the air piping in our building (and below the streets) was destroyed by a wall of water that came crashing through the front of the building. In addition, our Broad Street CO was essentially under water, as was much of the neighborhood, and indeed lower Manhattan."

Verizon said it does not have figures to show how much of its copper is insulated by paper rather than plastic. "We do not proactively replace paper cable with plastic. Typically, we only do so if the cable is defective/damaged or we need to increase the cable size. Nor do we have any data on the average age of our copper plant, but it’s fair to say that there is some that is decades old, but other parts that are just a few years old," the company said.

Bonomo asked rhetorically, if plastic-insulated cables are "better and more resilient than paper-insulated, then carrying that argument a bit further, shouldn’t we be converting even more of our subscribers to our fiber network?"

Worried about outages? Stock up on batteries

Could there be a way to switch to fiber while allowing phones to remain powered on during electricity outages? Power over fiber systems are being developed, but these have distance limitations.

Goldstein says one potential solution is to bring fiber close to buildings and then use copper over the last stretches. An underground terminal could supply electricity to phones in an individual neighborhood.

“You can't go sticking diesel generators in manholes; it isn't practical,” he said. “But if the manhole is in a city with natural gas service, you could use a fuel cell powered by natural gas.”

The phones would then remain powered on for as long as the gas lines work. But fuel cells are expensive, Goldstein noted. He isn’t hopeful that the FCC or state regulatory agencies will force phone companies to provide anything beyond small battery backups for individual customers.

“I expect they'll get away with the 8-hour battery,” he said.

Verizon told Ars that "we have looked at various scenarios and different ways to power the [fiber] network but have found that they are inefficient and would limit the services we would provide over them. They had effects on quality, data speeds and capacity, all of which are the opposite of what our subscribers want."

The new backup unit Verizon developed to replace the eight-hour backup uses D-cell batteries to provide 20 hours of talk time and 30 hours of standby time, and it's being offered in a "handful of markets," the company said.

"We are getting good feedback on the use of it in this limited rollout. We expect to more formally introduce it in the coming months," Verizon said.

Young's blog post pointed out that some customers "rely primarily on their mobile phones, or use cordless phones which themselves don’t work during a power outage."

"When we offer a backup power product to our customers, only a small percentage seem to take it, indicating to us that an alternate power (or backup power) source is not a high priority," Verizon told Ars.

As usual, government moves slowly

“To me, that's unacceptable,” Keys said of the limited power backups for fiber-based phones. “You're giving me newer technology, but it doesn't even do what the older technology did... what does that do for me when [my power is] out for 12 days?”

Further Reading

The FCC doesn’t yet have to decide exactly how it will regulate phone networks after the PSTN is completely retired. But it isn’t moving quickly to investigate complaints about the existing copper networks.

The letter from 12 consumer advocacy groups asking the FCC to investigate the reported problems did not spur any action. The FCC did publish a blog post a week before that letter to inform customers about the ongoing phone network transition and to remind providers that they have to obtain the FCC’s permission and give customers notice before discontinuing service.

But the FCC has not launched any investigation in response to the consumer advocacy groups’ request. “There has been no official action as of yet,” an FCC spokesperson told Ars.

"Where complaints and evidence call into question whether a carrier is properly maintaining the network for its basic service, or whether a carrier is telling at least some customers they cannot purchase basic voice service, the Commission should initiate enforcement proceedings to ensure carriers continue to fulfill their fundamental obligations as common carriers," Griffin of Public Knowledge wrote in a followup letter to the FCC on August 1.

Keys does not appreciate the delay. "Why isn't the FCC looking out for the public?" he asked. "I don't understand this."

Promoted Comments

Here's a thought: if you live in an area that frequently has long power outages, then you should probably pay for your own emergency power supply. I don't know why everyone else should be subsidizing maintenance and repair for outdated obsolete equipment so that people who live in hurricane zones can avoid having their own backup power.

Preparing for the safety and well-being of yourself and your family in an emergency is just being a responsible adult.

And if they are poor/elderly/disabled and cannot afford to pay for an emergency generator, what do they do? Spend money they don't have moving to a more expensive area with better infrastructure?

Conventional landline service has enjoyed both a protected monopoly and a government-granted Universal Service subsidy for decades, for the sole purpose of providing a lifeline. Make no mistake, the former Bell companies, Verizon included, have profited from this arrangement. It gave them a stable stream of revenue that they used to finance their build-out of unregulated fiber services.

Yeah, they kept bugging me to go fiber. I finally just ditched the land line. At the end, all I ever received on it were calls from evil telemarketers, poll takers, charities of a dubious nature, random people speaking languages from the Far Lands, and, well, Verizon bugging me to go to fiber.

I do miss fucking with the telemarketers sometimes. But not that much.

It's important to remember that Verizon isn't building out fiber anymore (it's only mobile getting built out now)...as they would much rather customer's get their data through mobile - which is orders of magnitude more expensive per GB...

This is also why all of these mega corp communication firms (AT&T as well) need to be shattered into their individual pieces (copper phone, fiber and wireless) - so that each piece/business can do the best for itself.

Here's a thought: if you live in an area that frequently has long power outages, then you should probably pay for your own emergency power supply. I don't know why everyone else should be subsidizing maintenance and repair for outdated obsolete equipment so that people who live in hurricane zones can avoid having their own backup power.

Preparing for the safety and well-being of yourself and your family in an emergency is just being a responsible adult.

And if they are poor/elderly/disabled and cannot afford to pay for an emergency generator, what do they do? Spend money they don't have moving to a more expensive area with better infrastructure?

Conventional landline service has enjoyed both a protected monopoly and a government-granted Universal Service subsidy for decades, for the sole purpose of providing a lifeline. Make no mistake, the former Bell companies, Verizon included, have profited from this arrangement. It gave them a stable stream of revenue that they used to finance their build-out of unregulated fiber services.

First, I really tire of "think of the [old people/children]" being trotted out for the emotional appeal. I highly doubt a whole wire area is populated by no one but people incapable of providing basic necessities for themselves. As for the portion that are in that situation - that's what a community is for.

I agree completely that the community called the United States of America, acting through the FCC, should require that any sort of replacement for the PSTN, no matter what medium that data is carried over, should have reliability requirements, and time-of-service requirements far, far longer than 8 hours. Further, it's completely obvious that:a) the reliability of the communications network is seriously degraded when we rely on each endpoint of that network to provide their own power in case of an emergency (because plenty of people will either fail to prepare, or will prepare inappropriately).b) backup power generation is currently incredibly inefficient at small scales, and the efficiency grows substantially as scale increases

These three things (the value of a universal communications system, the detrimental effects of leaving emergency planning to individuals alone, and the economies of scale available WRT power generation and distribution) point obviously to the need for regulation of the fiber-based communications system, done in such a way that backup power may be provided for endpoints in a reasonable manner. Something like a power distribution network separate from the usual one, perhaps run along with the fiber bundles, maybe.

I'm also all for upgrading technologies, and not hanging onto legacy equipment, incidentally. I'm just aware of the staggering difference in capabilities between the CO-powered copper pair POTS gear out there, and the endpoint-powered fiber system being pushed in to replace it. Failures in communications networks are guaranteed to incur substantial costs in terms of EMS/Fire/Police/Rescue deployments, cause a few deaths here and there, and add greatly to the stress and worry of a bunch of people all over the country, every time there's a major disaster.

OK, I actually registered for an account just so I could post a comment on this article.

When I was in college (this was in '99) I took a class on telecommunications policy and regulations. (Yes, I was that nerdy that I found reading 200 page regulatory filings to be fascinating). It was shortly after the Telecommunications Act of 1996 had passed, (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telecommun ... ct_of_1996) and there was a ton of new regulation being written and a lot of questions about how huge changes in both the market and the legal landscape would affect the industry.

Mind you, when the law was passed the state of the market and technology was way different than it is now. At that time, Regional Bell Operating Carriers (like Bell Atlantic) weren't even allowed to offer long distance service - that was finally just being opened up. DSL was state-of-the-art. Pagers were ubiquitous, and mobile phones only existed in cars. People got email through dial-up service on AOL. So the POTS was still the foundation for almost all telecommunications in the country.

The engineers who designed the POTS were obsessed with reliability. Most of the network had been built out during the Cold War, so having a communications system that could be relied upon to work in the event of a war was a serious consideration and design requirement. Given that the system was designed by a monopoly (AT&T) allowed the engineers to design a holistic solution where they controlled everything from the phone on your desk to the switching stations in between.

I was fortunate enough that our professor was well respected within the industry and we were able to visit inside a Central Office (CO), where all the local phone lines for a neighborhood come in. (This was before 9/11 - I highly doubt he would have been able to get us access today).

The tour of the facility was fascinating and extremely impressive from an engineering perspective. There were 3 floors and a basement. Each floor had a dedicated purpose. The most impressive was the basement, which was solely focused on power.

The power system at your central office for your landline (assuming you still have one) is triply-redundant. Yes, triple.

1. The station is powered by 2 different electrical substations running at 50% capacity with a cross-over breaker. If either substation goes offline, the building is switched over to the fallover substation with no interruption.

2. Assuming both substations go offline, the building had 2 diesel generators that could power the entire building and enough fuel to run for at least 2 months. They spun up the generators once a month and powered the building for several hours to ensure they were reliable. (They actually warned us before we entered that if the alarm sounded we needed to get out of the room ASAP because the noise in the room approached 200 decibels).

3. Assuming both of those systems failed, the entire basement was composed almost entirely of nickel-cadmium batteries that were approximately 3 feet tall and about a foot in diameter. These were stacked across the floor and on shelves 3 high. They consumed almost the entire floor, and some had been running continuously for 40+ years. In the event of a complete catastrophic power loss, the batteries could run the building (and consequently all of the phone lines connected to it) for 3 days.

The fascinating part was that in reality the batteries were actually powering the POTS network the whole time. The substations and generators were simply constantly recharging the batteries, which were what ended up powering the POTS through low voltage DC current.

The engineer giving us the tour said that their goal was that your phone line had reliability equivalent to only 30 seconds of downtime for every year of service (not counting external factors like a treetaking out a telephone pole). I tried doing the math but I can't figure out how many 9s of reliability that is.

The rest of the building, as you worked your way up, focused on local landline connection termination (1st floor), long distance switching (2nd floor), and Internet service (3rd floor, almost empty at the time).

I think most people here who have grown up on VOIP or wireless haven't considered the reality that in the event of a regional (or national) emergency, having a workable communications system is an absolute *necessity*. If you can't communicate, you can't accomplish anything. This isn't the problem of a tree falling in your neighborhood and you are without service for a couple of hours. That's an inconvenience. I'm talking Hurricane Sandy type disasters, where you may go days or weeks without power. If you can't contact your loved ones, or government agencies and relief organizations can't coordinate, you can't get anything done.

For those of you who say you can just get a battery backup for your own home, keep in mind that does you no good if the rest of the network is down. A communications system is only useful if you can connect to every other endpoint on the network. If you have power but no one else does, you have a well powered and expensive paperweight (assuming you still have paper). To that point, if your phone has power but the switching station does not, or the cell towers in half the city are down, you still aren't able to communicate with anyone else. And that doesn't even get close to the problem of long-distance connections.

For those who say this should be accommodated for those in "high risk" areas - what is high risk? Until Hurricane Sandy, I don't think most people would have considered NYC high risk for a disaster. How about San Francisco when the next earthquake hits? Cellular does you no good if the towers have no power. Fiber is the same.

I'm not being a Luddite and saying we should cling to our copper wires forever. But I feel many younger (I'm guessing) readers haven't ever experienced prolonged outages of critical services (electricity, water, communications, etc.). We've gotten so accustomed to always-on, always-available communication services that we've lost the ability to even consider a disaster response plan of how we could manage in a calamity. We've also been fortunate that we haven't had a serious strategic military threat against us in decades (although terrorism might be a good one to consider). Both of these factors have (IMHO) caused us to become complacent against good disaster planning when it comes to a communications infrastructure.

Yes, clearly the future is in broadband and technologies such as fiber. However, don't just throw away the extremely important factor of reliability and dependability when it comes to communications. People in some areas have legitimate concerns when it comes to the reliability of their telephone system, and as a society, we need to make sure we have considered the risks of catastrophic failure to portions of our infrastructure that we can withstand and still function effectively at a governmental and societal level.

The POTS (copper) phone system was carefully engineered by The Bell System (RIP) to be reliable and surviveable. No fancy fiber splice trucks needed, just a trained lineman with his tools could repair a downed line. And all the complex, (relatively) lower reliability stuff like switching computers and batteries were located at the central office, where they could be easily repaired.

The terminal units (telephones) are built like brick outhouses and were (up until touch tone) completely passive devices, with no transistors. Protected by surge arrestors, the Western Electric manufactured phones in your home were designed to last for decades without any maintenance at all.

Now, compare the above with cheaply made import phones, and 8-hour battery backup on the fiber interfaces. It almost makes me cry, thinking about what we had and what we are giving up. The linemen used to take pride in their work, now the poles in my neighborhood are covered with abandoned in place drop wires and sloppy wire management. Because the local companies are hiring contractors and pay by the job, so everything is done as quickly as possible and any reliability issues are the customer's problem.

After looking at about a third of the comments posted to date, it seems that well over half the commenters are missing this simple, fundamental point:

Verizon is deliberately letting its DSL network decay, and though it **claims** that FIOS is an acceptable substitute (which is broadly true, in a purely technical sense), it is NOT PROVIDING that substitute in a consistent or general fashion. Verizon is much more interested in 1) forcing people into inadequate, expensive wireless contracts, and 2) shedding as many skilled technicians as it can get away with.

No doubt the DSL network is more expensive to maintain than Verizon would like. Verizon "management" will fret as long as a single technician is on the payroll. On the other hand, considering that DSL allows century-old infrastructure to support 20th-21st century data services throughout North America, it makes the copper network a very valuable legacy. Verizon's decision to let it rot, while NOT expanding FIOS to cover affected areas, makes the corporation one of the most pernicious vandals in history.